Asian Crispy Chicken Wings + sweet, spicy chili sauce

Tis’ the season for appetizers, delicious and flavorful small bites that we never, ever get tired of. When the jolly and hectic holidays arrive, we’re in a non stop dinner party mode, which can be either jolly or hectic. Between our weekly gathering of friends, family, neighbors and staff, thinking about what to serve small to medium to large groups every time can be very time consuming.

Appetizers are our tried and true dishes that are easy to make and easy to please. Having a few plates of appetizers out, a couple of cocktails, great conversation and roaring music can quickly fill up our guests and distract them from thinking that they need a full meal. Often times, we ourselves, can eat a plate appetizers and call it a dinner! Who doesn’t love appetizers? Who can’t live off appetizers? At a hectic party, just munching and boozing is perfectly legal and satisfying.

We love our appetizers, especially these crispy chicken wings with an spicy/sweet Asian sauce…yum, yum, yum. Give us a big plate of these crispy asian chicken wings, a couple of beers each and our bellies are happy.

And that’s just two of us! If we make this for our gang of brothers and their friends, we’re looking at making maybe, at least, 20 pounds of crispy chicken wings? How many kegs of beers? Brothers, if you’re reading this, we’ll provide the crispy chicken wings, YOU GUYS provide the beer! These crispy chicken wings are addicting not only because of the sauce that it’s tossed in, but because they’re fried to a gold crisp.

Every bite is slightly crunchy from the flour batter, the chicken meat is juicy down to the bone and the sweet/spicy sauce is finger biting good. When we made these, we ate them so quick and had to force ourselves to stop so that we can take the pictures. Getting our fingers all wrapped up with chicken wings glistening with sweet/spicy sauce makes it really, really hard to want to wash our hands, grab the camera and play photographer.

Oh, yes, we forgot. We have a food blog and we must….take…a picture… Interrupting a feast of crispy chicken wings for a picture took a little persuasion, but had to have something to show everyone how fun it is to eat with your hands and drink lots of beer. The only way to enjoy chicken wings, hot wings, or buffalo wings (what ever you want to call them) is with cold beer. That’s our pairing for this dish, just some good beer of your choice to wash it all down with.

Fry these chicken wings up ahead of time if you wish and they’ll still stay crispy. Right before you serve them, just top them of with the chicken wing sauce and top with some fresh scallions and cilantro. Definitely customize the sauce to your spice level too. Hook the chicken wings up with some extra heat and you will be rewarded with great flavors! -diane and todd Here’s the complete list of our chicken wing recipes.

Asian Crispy Chicken Wings + Spicy Sweet Chili Sauce Recipe

Yield:Serves 4

Total Time:30 min

Chicken wings can be prepared in different ways to achieve their crispness: fried or baked, with flour or not. To make them extra crisp, you can pre-poach (or pre-boil) them first to render off any excess fat. Visit this write up on different ways to prepare chicken wings. This recipe shows a fried technique, but you can certainly bake them if you like or pre-boil them before baking to render excess fat and make them crispy.

Ingredients:

about 2 pounds chicken wings, cut at joints.

1 cup rice flour or all purpose flour.

Grapeseed, peanut or vegetable oil for frying

2 large garlic cloves,finely minced

1 cup water

3 teaspoons sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 Tablespoons fish sauce or soy sauce. We highly recommend fish sauce, if you have it.

1 Tablespoon vinegar

1 Tablespoon garlic chili sauce, tabasco sauce, or sriracha sauce. OR about 2 finely minced thai chilis. Use a little less of these if you want it more mild, or use more if you want it extra spicy!

lots of fresh ground black pepper to taste

1 Tablespoon cornstarch or potato starch

Directions:

For the Sweet Spicy Chili Sauce: In small bowl, combine cornstarch and about 1 Tablespoon of water until mixture becomes watery, almost milky consistency. Combine well to break apart any cornstarch lumps, then set aside.

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Recipe Note for Salt: All recipes containing salt are based on kosher or sea salt amounts, not table salt. If using table salt, reduce the amount used to taste.

Awesome wings, added a bit more garlic pepper sauce, some cayenne, and a dash of rice wine vinegar because we like it EXTRA spicy. This easily became my favorite sauce, tied with traditional American buffalo sauce. Now it’s demanded when I make wings, or even when others make them. The recipe works great with boneless wings too!

Hi guys,
Firstly, I wanted to say that I love your site! I just found it recently and am completely in love with your recipes! Secondly, I was wondering if you could recommend a brand of fish sauce. I have purchased it in the past and the smell is absolutely horrible. My husband just informed me that someone told him that fish sauce actually smells great but we have to buy the right one. Any suggestions would greatly be appreciated!!

Thank you so much Karen.
Fish sauce is a debate of much passion in the Asian communities. Different households all have their favorite, so just cause these are our favorites, others might a conflicting option. Our number one go to is the Flying Lion fish sauce. The price on amazon is about 5 times what we pay for it in the Asian grocery stores, but if it is the only option… There is a newer brand called Red Boat which has some nice specialty fish sauces. They are kind of like nice olive oils. Almost a waste if it is going to be cooked into a dish and you can find a good quality, lesser expensive one, but oh so good straight up or for finishing dishes.
Otherwise, look for one the is and nice caramel color and clear, not murky. Another brand which we can usually find a little easier and is nice is the 3 Crabs brand.
For those who didn’t grow up with it (like this white boy here), almost any fish sauce would be hesitant in calling great smelling. They all have fish smell, it is fermented fish juice after all. But it has a magical quality when tasted in dishes. It brings the other ingredients alive. However when tossing some in a hot pan when you are cooking, make sure to have the vent on high.
Hope that helps.
BTW – do you know what brand it is that you purchased before?
Todd

I cook every night for my family, and I often look up recipes online, but I have never commented on any of them. This is now my comfort food, and I cook it all the time. I am a picky eater, and I rarely approve of most of the recipes I make, but this one is definitely a keeper. If you like spicy Asian food, try this for sure.

I found this site by searching for spicy sweet asian sauce. This recipe sounds amazing and I plan to try it this summer for a BBQ appetizer. I’ve looked around at your site briefly and I’m really impressed and you’ve done some really great work! The article about radishes and peach blossoms makes me anxious for spring here in MN. In fact, I was just planning my garden and a drip irrigation system for it tonight. Thanks for the great ideas and blog!

I think this recipe looks really interesting, and I am going to have to try it this weekend. The only question I have is at the end when thickening your sauce, you say add corn starch to the hot sauce/or liquid. Are you making a slurry by adding a table spoon or so of H20, or are you just adding the starch? I think I am going to add some water to mine, I have never had any luck with adding just the starch to hot liquid. It has always left clumps or goo in the sauce for me.

Revisiting chicken wings as apps for the holidays. Thanks for this post.

Eons ago, I had this appetizer in a restaurant (“white drumsticks”) and came up with my own version. Need a little labor though. Divide the wings at the joint and discard wing tips ( or save to boil for soup/broth). Debone smaller bone from the smaller part (“forearm”) of the wing then roll the meat towards the bigger end of the joint like a sleeve to resemble a drumstick. Marinade : soy sauce, grated ginger, grated garlic, minced scallions, sugar, sherry wine or Chinese cooking wine. I like to marinate overnight. Dip in batter ( flour, cornstarch, egg and water, a little baking powder for some puff). Deep fry. Kids and grown-ups love ‘em both and will ask ” where did you get such small ‘drumsticks?”

My issue is the high freigh cost the online shops charge for orders. They all seem to want to ship UPS and $11.00 is way too high for a $6.00 bottle of hot sauce.

I did find a online shop http://www.andyshotsauce.com that will ship Priority Mail, which cuts the cost in half. It’s still expensive, but not for a hot sauce I can’t find in the local stores.

Tom
You can also always make your own hot sauce. Here’s a link to our homemade sriracha style sauce and there are bunches of others out there. “If you can’t buy it reasonably, make it yourself.” That’s our motto. Actually we make almost all our sauces ourselves. They keep well and are more to our personal tastes. WORC

I am writing this comment not only because the wings look absolutely delicious, but also because I noticed the New Belgium beer cap in your photos. We have been to the brewery several times (husband is from CO) and are completely obsessed. I only wish they exported to Japan…sigh…

Oh. my. god. I want some! I love all the colorful bottle caps scattered around the dish. It not only brightens up the photo but reminds me just how good micro-brewed beers can be with sweet and spicy chicken! Love this post!

is it bad that i like my wings so hot that they leave a red rash around my mouth? probably.
meanwhile, i received my cinnamon and am currently doing some serious thinking about how to properly use it–thanks again!

It’s cruel to post something that delicious lsounding and then have such mouth-watering pictures too. All this reading about crispy chicken wings and looking at pictures of crispy chicken wings has left me very, very hungry.

Oh oh oh! I feel like running right over and scooting next to Diane and sitting down for some chicken wings and… no beer for me, but – why thank you, Todd! Such a sweetheart, I love his blackberry Tom Collins! You guys are always having such delicious food, but more than that, it’s always FUN and BEAUTIFUL food. I miss you!! (cuddles to Dante and Sierra).

It looks like it’ll be juice and water for me, yahrr I am a MAJOR chili lover as you know but when I saw “two thai chilis, minced…” my hairs stood on end! I’d love to have a big helping of that (with plenty of juice on the side!)!
I wish I had a recipe for you guys, though… Hmm, maybe I ought to be working on that

I really don’t like buffalo wings but I love these chicken wings. I can’t wait to make them for my friends, as long as they bring the beer. Thanks for the recipe. Your chicken wings looks so crisp, any suggestions for attaining this level of crispiness.

I’m very impressed that you fry chicken wings at home (instead of broiling). So much better — and I like the rice flour! Your dipping sauce looks great, too. I tend to thicken by reducing the sauce instead of cornstarch, but I bet your sauce clings to the wings much better!

It’s some kind of phenomenon how many crispy spicy chicken wings people can eat in a row… like you can eat more than the equivalent of a whole bird. But you couldn’t eat a whole bird in one sitting… it’s just one of life’s little mysteries!

Right, off to buy 20 pounds of chicken wings then… you bring over the beer